April 01, 2009

Pim Verbeek has been to two World Cups as an assistant coach - both times with Korea - but never as top dog.

With the lure of hands-on, day-to-day club coaching calling him after his time with Australia, this may be his only time to lead a country to the world's showpiece sporting event.

So he could be forgiven a nerve or two ahead of Wednesday night's game ... the 90 minutes that could effectively secure that prize.

Not nerves because the mission is likely to fail but simply because success is so close at hand.

Initially, he denies it - insisting simply that it's a big game but that no one can look beyond that.

However, as Verbeek talks, he betrays the advanced stage they are at in reaching his overriding goal: to make South Africa next year.

"I'll tell you tomorrow after the game how I feel then," he said. "For us now, it's a game we have to win. I'm not sitting all day thinking if we win we have qualified.

"I'm excited, yes. It's great to play in games like this and great to have my players in camp for a week, and have the time to speak with them about how we're going to play.

"It's fantastic - every football player, every coach, wants to be involved in games like this and we're looking forward to it.

"We're so close. We've been working so hard for 15 months with the travelling, the games, the lack of preparation, the injuries.

"Everyone has done their jobs this week to get the three points towards the World Cup and that's what we'll go for."